Reiki and Money

GUEST BLOGGER Susan Mitchell shares her understanding of Reiki and money. Susan learned First and Second degree Reiki practice from Hawayo Takata, the Reiki master who brought Reiki to the US from Japan with her Reiki master, Chujiro Hayashi, in the 1930s. Susan became a Reiki master in 1985. She and her husband Paul Mitchell are based in Idaho.

Reiki and moneyREIKI and MONEY: A Light Heart
by Susan Mitchell

Lately, I’ve been hearing Hawayo Takata’s voice in my ear.

She always said, “Reiki brings us health, success, happiness, and long life.” When she talked about these qualities, her voice held a wonderful lightness and wisdom. Part of the “success” she talked about certainly had to do with money.

But how do you find or maintain a light heart in the midst of dramatic economic change—change that may be affecting you very personally?

Reiki practitioners struggling with money

You may have struggled with money all your life—how to earn it, how to manage it, how to work with your feelings about it—so the present situation isn’t making things any easier.

Although people talk about money as energy (which is undeniable!), it’s also a basic fact that money is physical and only has use and meaning in the physical world. At the moment of our death, money will be of no help to us at all.

Seeking money to provide meaning in life is a dead end.

Is it Reiki and money, or emotions and assumptions?

We know we can get pretty stuck around money — and relationships, and health, and other things, too.  You can feel undeserving, guilty, greedy, fearful, mystified, or resentful, to name a few.

But all of these emotions are not actually about money, they are about what you’ve been taught, assumptions you’ve made, beliefs, patterns and habits. Money is neutral.

When you step back and look at your attitudes about money, you have an opportunity to see what’s driving you—where you’re out of balance.

Money is neutral

It is never about money. It’s about love and thus about fear and lack of connection with Source, however you define that. It’s not a question of whether I value myself, of “how much am I worth,” or what I deserve.

And it is certainly not a measure of spiritual attainment.

As a friend of mine says: Money is not a measure of your worth, it’s an opportunity for reflection. It gives you information that is unique to you and your situation. It’s not there to judge you or measure your value.

I find that insight very helpful and tricky and subtle. Our needs and longings deeply affect our relationship with money because they are our core challenges and aspirations.

Reiki teaches us that the deeper our connection with life energy, with Source, the more we will move into right relationship with money, family, friends, ourselves—everything.

When we turn to Source to fill our deepest needs, our hearts and minds can remain happy no matter the external. Our minds can be free of worry and fear—just for today.

I’m sure this was the source of the lightness I heard in Hawayo Takata’s voice.

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Also by Susan Mitchell:
Hawayo Takata’s Nerve Stroke
A Discipline for Happiness 

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15 thoughts on “Reiki and Money”

  1. Thank you for sharing. This was definitely right on time with me and my thought process about financial gain, being a healer, and explaining to myself the differences and how tricky it can be to separate the prosperity of the source from the prosperity of the material plane.

    Thank you again!

  2. I agree, Jo, and it’s probably not even a conscious process. It’s up to us as practitioners to appreciate the value of Reiki treatment enough that we set up our interaction in a balanced way from the beginning. If we don’t do that, how likely is it that the client would think of it?

    This is why, in public events, I give only Reiki samples without charge. A few minutes of Reiki touch is enough for people to see what is possible and then pursue it if they want it enough to pay for it.

    1. I have no idea if this will even post….im on my phone and these posts are quite old.
      i,ve always had an issue with charging for Reiki. About 18 years ago i embarked on a healer development course after having quite profound experiences after receiving spiritual healing from two separate healers. (neither of these healers charged for their services but happily accepted donations )….long story short..whilst on the healer development course the issue of money and charging for our services came up. The teacher mentioned that one of her past students had said that money was like oxygen. I thought what a load of old tosh!! Money could never be equated to the life giving energy of oxygen. Many years have passed and i have come to understand that unfortunately living in todays world of the 21st century, money is an absolute necessity ( unless we live on an island we have been given and are completely self sufficient). We all need money to survive in todays world. I have never charged for the healing i have offered over the past 18 years, for me i always felt like money got in the way. Reiki and all other ways of applying spiritual healing cannot be quantified in the same way as say a massage. Some clients have very deep inner experiences and spiritual awakenings as a result of Reiki…some have great physical shifts in their current pain and health issues, some experience very little at all. But because Reiki is in essence spiritual in nature we never know what is likely to happen for a client. We can never know what a client needs or what kind of results will be brought about because of the treatment offered. I have now just opened a small holistic centre with a friend and for the first time advertising Reiki treatments with a price tag! It’s still not sitting very comfortably with me, but bills for the centre have to be paid. To help me find a happy balance to this i will be offering a donation based reiki clinic on a regular basis for those who feel the need for longer term treatments. I want Reiki to be accessible to as many people as possible. I would never want Reiki to just be there for those who could afford it…but there for those who need it.
      and if i’m completely honest i derive so much pleasure, contentment and soul food from sharing Reiki with another… I almost feel like i should be paying them for allowing me to step into that sacred space with them. It’s not me being altruistic but actually quite selfish ! Aha…
      ( sorry if I’ve waffled on a bit)

  3. I find that if you don’t charge for your services, people adopt the mentality, “well if you don’t put a value on your service, why should I?” Most of the people who pay for my services come back. The ones who got it for free, don’t.

  4. I disagree with your interpretation that by charging a fee, we are saying only some people are worthy of our time and attention, and I think it is important to underline that this is only one interpretation.

    We could just as easily interpret it as saying to the world that Reiki is to be respected as a profession in the way, for example, acupuncture is, and we are modeling how to be in the world and be of service. Being paid for our time and skills does not mean that we are serving money; it means we are paying our bills. How can that be a bad thing?

    If we don’t take care of ourselves and our responsibilities, how can we be of help to others? That’s why I stress to my students that as Reiki practitioners, our most important service to the world is our daily self-treatment.

    We all find ways to give back to our communities that go beyond our billable hours. I was first brought into conventional health care to serve the disenfranchised portion of our population that received care at inner-city hospital HIV clinics. In the beginning, I offered this work as community service. If I had not been paid by my clients so that I could support my family, I would not have been able to offer this service. Look at how much good has come out of that work–but it had to happen on the foundation of meeting my responsibilities first. And as Reiki treatment is seen as a viable option in health care, it will become even more available to disenfranchised people.

    In life, there are always obstacles, and there are always ways to address them. For some people the obstacles seem to be money, for others lack of health, for others wrong understanding. But no one alive escapes the need to overcome obstacles. And when we overcome obstacles–especially the inner obstacles–we have so much more to give.

  5. https://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/note.php?note_id=383651628144&id=733389793

    Although he speaks of visual art, I draw parallels to other beautiful offerings such as Reiki.

    Looking at the quality of his work, I’d say he could be labeled a “professional” although he does not charge.

    I feel it is a tug of war between charging and not charging. To what degree are we supporting elitism or class structures by keeping our good from one another based solely on money as a form of exchange?

    Do we not see this pan out in hospitals where, unfortunately, people are denied support because they are not covered monetarily? Is this not a challenge we ought to overcome?

    By charging a fee, we are saying to the world, only some are worthy of our time and attention – those with money. In essence, we are serving money, not people. We are upholding the modern dependence on money as the only form of thrival. Perhaps this is merely a personal challenge…

  6. Roseanna, I don’t hesitate to charge for treatment. Because I earn my livelihood through Reiki, I treat far more people than I would if I worked a 40-hour job doing something else and offered Reiki only in my free time.

    How we price our services is, in part, a personal journey—simple for some of us, painful for others. Reflecting on the points I mentioned in the blog-post helped me to see where I tended to be muddled around money.

    For the past 7 years, I’ve also sponsored a monthly clinic with some of my Reiki students and friends. This has been a rewarding way for me to care for people who otherwise would be unlikely to receive Reiki. All donations go to the local Head Start which sponsors us. People can attend as often as they like—some have come for years.

    (My email access is sporadic this week—I’m in Minnesota for a family funeral.)

  7. Roseanna, how can we be professionals if we don’t charge for our services? Other health care providers, such as doctors, nurse practitioners, massage therapists, meditation teachers and health coaches, are paid for their services.

    By paying us, our clients make it possible for us to practice Reiki full time. People who practice full time become more experienced practitioners.

    By doing business with integrity, Reiki practitioners model another aspect of health and well-being for their clients, and make it possible for Reiki to become more accessible.

    And in my experience, Reiki practitioners who are able to support themselves comfortably also find ways to offer service beyond their billable hours.

  8. Lovely words, Susan
    in reply to the post on how do you charge for something you
    would gladly share/trade… I’ve always thought of the Reiki
    energy as being free, but MY time has a value, and so I feel
    comfortable charging a fee.

  9. I love this post, because it speaks the truth about money.

    How does this pan out practically tho? How does one go about a business practice of trade rather than merely offering? Is trade as good as donation? Is it loving to put a price tag on something we have to offer the world? What is the best way to price your own gift offerings to the world?

  10. Your words are better than gold! These insights are rich (sorry can’t help the word play!) and I’ve read them a few times to really try to catch the feeling of that “lightness.” I like what your friend said about money being an opportunity for reflection as opposed to a measure of worth…but I especially appreciate your comment that “I find this insight very helpful and tricky and subtle.” I will revisit these insights and I look forward to where they will lead me. Thank you, Susan.

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